The Current

Michael Cohen’s Anger at His Republican Antagonists

At one point during the hearing, Republicans put up a poster featuring a blown-up image of Michael Cohen’s face which read “Liar, liar, pants on fire.”

Photograph by Mark Peterson / Redux for The New Yorker

Throughout the day, Michael Cohen has shown his exasperation with his Republican questioners. He has sighed, nodded sarcastically, and, at one point, asked a Republican congressman who questioned who might be funding Cohen’s legal team if he would like to contribute to it. Cohen was perhaps least enamored with Representative Jim Jordan, of Ohio, who, as other Republicans have throughout the hearing, repeatedly impugned Cohen’s honesty, citing his lies to Congress in 2017. At one point, Jordan claimed that Cohen disputed the illegality of his own actions. “His remorse is nonexistent,” Jordan yelled. “He just debated a member of Congress, saying he really didn’t do anything wrong with the false bank things I’m guilty of and going to prison for!”

In fact, as Cohen then replied, he had acknowledged his guilt at multiple points during the hearing. “You know that’s not what I said. I pled guilty, and I take responsibility for my actions. Shame on you, Mr. Jordan. That’s not what I said.”

Representative Mark Meadows, of North Carolina, one of Cohen’s main Republican antagonists, took issue with Cohen’s characterization of President Trump as a racist, offering the opinion of the former Eric Trump Foundation employee and current Housing and Urban Development official Lynne Patton, who is African-American, as counter-evidence, after summoning her to stand behind him silently, as a prop.

“You made some very demeaning comments about the President that Miss Patton doesn’t agree with,” Meadows said. “In fact, it has to do with racism. She says that, as a daughter of a man born in Birmingham, Alabama, that there was no way that she would work for an individual who was racist.”

“Do you have proof?” Meadows asked Cohen, loudly.

“I do,” Cohen replied.

“Yes or no,” Meadows said.

“I do,” Cohen replied again.

“Where’s the proof?” Meadows demanded.

“Ask Miss Patton,” Cohen said, “how many people who are black are executives at the Trump Organization.”

Meadows cut him off. “Mr. Cohen, Mr. Cohen, we could go through this. I would ask unanimous consent that her entire statement be put in the record.”

At one point, Republicans put up a poster featuring a blown-up image of Cohen’s face which read “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” a sentence actually said by Representative Paul Gosar, of Arizona. Cohen referred to the poster in his answer to a question about why he turned against the President. “There are several factors,” Cohen said. “Helsinki, Charlottesville, watching the daily destruction of our civility to one another, putting up silly things like this.” At “this,” he pointed to the sign, which was promptly taken down and replaced with another. “Really unbecoming of Congress.”

One of the more dramatic moments for Republicans on the committee involved a document Cohen had filled out indicating that he hadn’t been employed as a lobbyist for a foreign government in the past two years. When Cohen said that he had, in fact, worked for foreign entities, Meadows held up the document and claimed that Cohen had committed perjury by not disclosing those entities on the form.

“Why didn’t you put them on the form?” Meadows shouted. “It says it’s a criminal offense not to put them on this form! For the last two years—why didn’t you do that?”

There was some rustling in the background after Meadows’ remarks, as he showed the document to an animated G.O.P. colleague, Representative Jordan. But Representative Katie Hill, a Democrat of California, deflated this line of attack.

“The question is, in fact, whether witnesses have any contracts or payments originating with a foreign government,” Hill said. “It does not cover all foreign entities, just foreign-government entities.”